Officers won’t be charged in Tamir Rice killing
The Justice CLEVELAND —
Department on Tuesday officially closed the investigation into Tamir Rice’s shooting anddeclaredtherewas insufficient evidence to charge the police officers involved in the boy’s death.
Officials released a summary that explained the decision involving the 12-year-old boy’s death in 2014, stating that not enough evidence exists to bring charges of civil-rights violations or obstruction of justice.
“In sum, after extensive examination of the facts in this tragic event, career Justice Department prosecutors have concluded that the evidence is insufficient to prove beyond a reasonable doubt thatOfficer [Timothy] Loehmann willfully violated Tamir Rice’s constitutional rights, or that Officers Loehmann or [Frank] Garmback obstructed justice,” the report said.
The report angered the boy’s mother, Samaria Rice.
“It’s a horrible feeling,” she said. “It really is. It continues to show how broken the system is.”
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after Samaria Rice and attorneys for her family sharply criticized Justice Department officials and demanded to knowwhy they failed to convene a grand jury.
The attorneys wondered why then-Attorney General William Barr refused to listen to prosecutorswho had sought the secret panel and why officials failed to notify
the boy’s family about that decision.
On Tuesday, the family’s attorney, Subodh Chandra, called the process tainted. “The Rice family has been cheated of a fair process again,” Chandra said.
Loehmann shot Tamir at Cudell Recreation Center on Nov. 22, 2014, while the boywas playing with an airsoft
pellet gun. He died the next day. Loehmann was a rookie officer and had been on the department for less than eight months. He was a passenger in a car driven by a veteran training officer, Frank Garmback.
Thetwoofficersresponded to a report ofsomeonepointing a gun at people outside the recreation center on the city’s west side. The caller told a 911 dispatcher that the gun looked fake, but that information was never relayed to the officers.
In order to prove a civil-rights violation, the governmentwould have needed to proveLoehmann’s actions were unreasonable andwillful, the report states.
The Justice Department explanation noted that officers are permitted to use deadly force when they believe a suspect poses an “imminent threat of serious physical harm, either to the officer or to others.”
Loehmann f i red his weaponbecause“itappeared to him that Tamirwas reaching for his gun,” the document said. To accuse Loehmann of the allegation, according to the report, prosecutors would need to showthe boywas not reaching for his gun and that the officer “did not perceive that Tamir was reaching for his gun.… The evidence is insufficient for the government to prove this.”
The report also shows prosecutors reviewed the evidence to determine whether they could prove that Loehmann and Garmback obstructed justice in their statements to law enforcement officers.
For prosecutors to file the charges, they would have needed to prove that the officers offered false statements to hinder a federal investigation.
The report stressed that the officers made several statements, including minutes after the shooting “without time to reflect, discuss or view video.
“Some of their statements aremore detailed than others and with slightly different verbiage, but all ofwhich were generally consistent, particularly on the seminal facts,” the summary states.
Loehmann was fired in 2017. He was dismissed for lying on his application to join the department. Garmbackwas suspended 10 days, but an arbitrator reduced the suspension to five days. He remains on the force.
Cleveland settled a federal civil-rights lawsuit with the boy’s family for $6 million. A Cuyahoga County grand jury in2015 declined to bring any charges.
Attempts to reach Henry Hilow, the attorney for the ClevelandPolice Patrolmen’s Association, were unsuccessful.